My Fifth Step Witness Was My Infant Daughter in her Crib – Mitchell K.

About This Speaker Tape

Mitchell K. shares his story at a Primary Purpose Group on Long Island, opening with his early drinking at age 12 or 13 and the rapid progression into daily, heavy alcohol use. He describes driving home from photographing a wedding after consuming massive quantities of vodka, unable to feel his hands or feet, navigating only by watching the road poles. He moved from the Bronx to Orange County, New York, deliberately renting a house across the street from a bar to avoid DWIs. After putting his hand through a glass door during a drunken argument — requiring over fifty stitches — his doctor told him to go home and have a glass of wine, which he took as permission to keep drinking.

His wife, attending Overeaters Anonymous meetings at the same location as AA, began sneaking AA pamphlets into their house. She eventually removed all other reading material from the bathroom, leaving him nothing but the pamphlets during his early morning routine. He wandered into a church in the Bronx one night, saw the AA circle-and-triangle symbol, and felt immediately at home among the old-timers who put their arms around him. He spent his entire first year of sobriety going to meetings — his Social Security statement shows he earned only sixty dollars that year.

Despite not drinking, his life remained unmanageable. He lost weight, discovered women other than his wife, and his affair was exposed through a phone bill. Facing the collapse of his marriage with no tools beyond "don't drink and go to meetings," he went on a spiritual search that led him to Father Martin, the AA archives and Nell Wing, and ultimately to Clarence Snyder — an old-timer whose story appeared in the first three editions of the Big Book. Clarence took him through all twelve steps in a single weekend, the way early AAs had done it, and Mitchell describes this as the turning point that gave him actual recovery rather than mere abstinence.

Today Mitchell has been sober for decades but has experienced homelessness, three divorces, and arrest in sobriety. He now deals with COPD, emphysema, and elevated liver enzymes — lasting consequences of his drinking and smoking years. He is currently weighing whether to retire and move to Florida to care for his 95-year-old mother, who recently fell and lay on the floor all night rather than disturb her children. He emphasizes that recovery is about being of maximum service to Higher Power and others, not simply avoiding a drink, and credits Primary Purpose groups for keeping that message alive.

Topics

Timestamps

• 0:00 Introduction and remarks on primary purpose, the long form of Tradition 5, and page 77's real purpose of maximum service
• 6:00 Drinking story begins — started at 12 or 13, drinking to fit in, rapid progression to daily heavy use
• 10:00 Driving home from a wedding after a gallon and a half of vodka, navigating by road poles because he could not feel his feet
• 13:00 Wife's campaign of AA pamphlets, removing bathroom reading material, and Mitchell reading them at 3 AM before catching the bus
• 16:00 Walking into a church in the Bronx, seeing the circle-and-triangle, feeling at home for the first time
• 20:00 First year sober earning sixty dollars, road trips to step meetings and Big Book meetings across the region
• 25:00 The affair exposed through the phone bill, marriage collapse, and the turning point of hearing a man at a meeting applauded for kicking the dog but not drinking
• 32:00 Spiritual search — contacting Father Martin through Nell Wing, the empty seat coincidence at the theater, connecting with Clarence Snyder
• 40:00 Flying Clarence up for a retreat in Middletown, going through all twelve steps in a weekend the way early AAs did it
• 50:00 Life in long-term sobriety — 95-year-old mother's fall, COPD diagnosis, being of maximum service, and gratitude for Primary Purpose groups